{"schema_version":"bf_book_companion_v1","release_id":"20260417T204117Z-pairingsrefresh","book":{"amazon_purchase_url":"https://www.amazon.com/dp/1479804312?tag=bookfrontier-20","asin":"1479804312","authors":["Carol Fadda-Conrey"],"book_id":"9781479804313","canonical_url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/contemporary-arab-american-literature-1479804312","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9781479804313.jpg?v=20260417T204117Z-pairingsrefresh%3A2026-04-17T20%3A41%3A17Z","description":"The last couple of decades have witnessed a flourishing of Arab-American literature across multiple genres. Yet, increased interest in this literature is ironically paralleled by a prevalent bias against Arabs and Muslims that portrays their long presence in the US as a recent and unwelcome phenomenon. Spanning the 1990s to the present, Carol Fadda-Conrey takes in the sweep of literary and cultural texts by Arab-American writers in order to understand the ways in which their depictions of Arab homelands, whether actual or imagined, play a crucial role in shaping cultural articulations of US citizenship and belonging. By asserting themselves within a US framework while maintaining connections to their homelands, Arab-Americans contest the blanket representations of themselves as dictated by the US nation-state. Deploying a multidisciplinary framework at the intersection of Middle-Eastern studies, US ethnic studies, and diaspora studies, Fadda-Conrey argues for a transnational discourse that overturns the often rigid affiliations embedded in ethnic labels. Tracing the shifts in transnational perspectives, from the founders of Arab-American literature, like Gibran Kahlil Gibran and Ameen Rihani, to modern writers such as Naomi Shihab Nye, Joseph Geha, Randa Jarrar, and Suheir Hammad, Fadda-Conrey finds that contemporary Arab-American writers depict strong yet complex attachments to the US landscape. She explores how the idea of home is negotiated between immigrant parents and subsequent generations, alongside analyses of texts that work toward fostering more nuanced understandings of Arab and Muslim identities in the wake of post-9/11 anti-Arab sentiments.","forthcoming":false,"isbn13":"9781479804313","publication_date":"20140530","publisher":"NYU Press","slug":"contemporary-arab-american-literature","subtitle":"Transnational Reconfigurations of Citizenship and Belonging","title":"Contemporary Arab-american Literature"},"discovery":{"categories":{"all":[{"bisac_code":"LIT004220","confidence_band":"high","label":"Middle Eastern Lit Crit","score":0.8083,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LIT004030","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Asian American Lit Crit","score":0.7537,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LIT004010","confidence_band":"medium","label":"African Lit Crit","score":0.744,"source":"bisac_hint_model"}],"hint":[{"bisac_code":"LIT004220","confidence_band":"high","label":"Middle Eastern Lit Crit","score":0.8083,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LIT004030","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Asian American Lit Crit","score":0.7537,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LIT004010","confidence_band":"medium","label":"African Lit Crit","score":0.744,"source":"bisac_hint_model"}],"publisher":[{"bisac_code":"LIT004020","confidence_band":"high","label":"American Lit Crit","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"SOC002010","confidence_band":"high","label":"How Cultures Work","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"}]},"genres":[{"label":"Middle Eastern Lit Crit","score":0.8083,"slug":"middle-eastern-lit-crit"},{"label":"Asian American Lit Crit","score":0.7537,"slug":"asian-american-lit-crit"},{"label":"African Lit Crit","score":0.744,"slug":"african-lit-crit"}],"reader_fit":["Good for readers who enjoy Middle Eastern Lit Crit","Good for readers who enjoy Middle Eastern Lit Crit and Asian American Lit Crit."],"related_lists":[],"series":null,"similar_books":[{"authors":["Mohamed-Salah Omri","Tayeb Salih"],"book_id":"9780415396448","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9780415396448.jpg?v=20260417T204117Z-pairingsrefresh%3A2026-04-17T20%3A41%3A17Z","score":9.2637,"title":"Nationalism, Islam and World Literature","url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/9780415396448"},{"authors":["Salma Khadra Jayyusi"],"book_id":"9780231132541","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9780231132541.jpg?v=20260417T204117Z-pairingsrefresh%3A2026-04-17T20%3A41%3A17Z","score":8.9843,"title":"Modern Arabic Fiction","url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/9780231132541"},{"authors":["Roger M. A. Allen","Roger Allen"],"book_id":"9780815626411","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9780815626411.jpg?v=20260417T204117Z-pairingsrefresh%3A2026-04-17T20%3A41%3A17Z","score":8.8262,"title":"The Arabic Novel","url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/9780815626411"},{"authors":["Zaina Arafat"],"book_id":"9780316612623","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9780316612623.jpg?v=20260417T204117Z-pairingsrefresh%3A2026-04-17T20%3A41%3A17Z","score":6.4541,"title":"Our Arab","url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/9780316612623"}],"topics":[],"what_you_get":["Reading lane: Middle Eastern Lit Crit and Asian American Lit Crit.","Publisher: NYU Press."]},"llm_signals":null,"source_presence":{"amazon":true,"book_detail":true,"goodreads":true,"llm_signals":false,"similarity_seed":true},"stats":{"amazon_ratings_count":5,"goodreads_ratings_count":6,"goodreads_reviews_count":1,"quality_score":0.8279}}